The Story
There are times I pull up to a red light and see a man standing on the corner with a cardboard sign, and something stirs in my heart. A nudge. Help him. Every once in a while I roll down the window. But if I’m honest, about 99 percent of the time I don’t. I talk myself out of it. I wonder what he’ll really do with the money. Drugs? Alcohol? Who knows? Then the light turns green and I drive on.
I’ve come to believe that nudge is often how God moves us. It’s not a loud voice. It’s a quiet pull on the heart. And I keep asking myself, what if God takes that small gift and uses it to change a life? I’m not telling anyone to hand cash to every person on a corner. That isn’t my point. My point is learning to feel the nudge and actually respond, whatever it’s about. That’s the difference between being all in and settling for 90 percent.
About 300 years after Jesus, men walked out into the Egyptian desert to seek God with everything they had. One day a young monk named Abba Lot came to an older monk named Abba Joseph. “Father,” he said, “as far as I can, I keep my rule. I fast a little. I pray. I meditate. I live in peace. As far as I can, I keep my thoughts clean. What else should I do?”
The old man stood, stretched his hands toward heaven, and his fingers looked like ten lamps of fire. He said, “If you will, you can become all flame.”
Not mostly flame. Not flame in most rooms of your life. All flame.
Pastor Bryan Jarrett told that story this Sunday at Northplace, and I haven’t been able to shake it. Lot wasn’t a bad man trying to become good. He was already good. He wanted to know what was left. Most of us who have been in church a long time are asking the same question, even if we never say it out loud.
The Scripture
“Jesus looked at him and loved him. ‘One thing you lack,’ he said. ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.’ At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.”
Mark 10:21-22 (NIV)
“Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.’”
Mark 10:27 (NIV)
How I Understand This Scripture
We usually cast the rich young ruler as the villain. I don’t think Mark tells it that way. This man ran to Jesus in public, something a man of his standing wouldn’t normally do. He knelt in the dirt. His question was sincere. When Jesus listed the commandments, the man said he had kept them since he was a boy, and Jesus didn’t argue. He was a good man.
Then comes the line I can’t get past. Jesus looked at him and loved him. Everything Jesus said next came out of that love. He wasn’t trying to catch the man in a sin. He was inviting a good man all the way in.
The man walked away sad, not bad. He was still moral, still religious, still sincere. He was just close without being all in. That is the real danger for good people. We probably won’t end up wicked. We may end up sad, standing right beside a joy we never step into.
When the disciples asked who could possibly be saved, Jesus told them plainly. With man it is impossible, but not with God. As I understand it, Jesus isn’t telling us to white knuckle our way into full surrender. He is asking us to trust Him enough to take the last step, and His grace does what our willpower never could.
My Reflection
Pastor Bryan said something that hit me hard. There is a difference between believing in Jesus and believing Jesus. Believing in Him means I agree He is who He says He is. Believing Him means I do what He says. One is agreement. The other is obedience. James reminds us that even the demons believe, and they shudder.
He described the soul as a house with 30 rooms. Over the years we hand God the keys to 27 of them: Sunday mornings, our giving, our marriage, our kids, our language. Then we keep three for ourselves. Maybe it’s a grudge. Maybe it’s how we spend our time or money. Maybe it’s the comfort we run to instead of running to God. By American church standards, 90 percent looks pretty good. But Jesus doesn’t grade on a curve. He stands at the door of that last room, not to shame us, but to look at us the way He looked at that young man. With love.
Sometimes that last room is as simple as the nudge at a red light. It’s the moment God says move, and I decide whether to obey or drive on.
Another picture stayed with me. Luke says Mary “treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19, NIV). The word Luke uses for ponder carries the idea of holding things together, carrying the tension and letting it change you instead of handing it back the way it came. At the cross, John tells us Mary stood. She didn’t scream at the soldiers or curse the crowd. The hatred of that moment stopped with her.
Pastor Bryan put it this way: whatever we don’t transform, we will transmit. An extension cord passes along whatever runs through it. A water filter holds back what shouldn’t get through. I’ve been the cord more times than I want to admit. Someone is short with me, so I’m short back. I carry the stress of my day through the front door, and within ten minutes everyone in the house feels it. A real disciple becomes a filter, the place where gossip, bitterness, and cynicism stop instead of moving on to the next person or the next generation.
So today I’m asking myself which rooms I’m still holding onto. I don’t want to walk away sad. I want to be all flame.
A Prayer
Lord Jesus, I’ve gotten pretty good at being good, and I confess that good has become a hiding place for me. You know the rooms I’ve kept for myself, and I won’t pretend they aren’t there. Thank You for looking at me with love and not shame. I can’t surrender those rooms in my own strength, so I’m asking for Your grace to do what I can’t. Teach me to recognize Your nudge and to answer it instead of driving on. Make me a filter and not a cord. Let bitterness, anger, and gossip stop with me. Move me from amazement to real awe, and from believing in You to believing You. I want to be all flame. I surrender all. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Watch the Message
Hear Pastor Bryan’s full sermon here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KusjbiZPiO8
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